About 40,000 people are released from prison into the Philadelphia region each year. Many of these ex-offenders find it difficult to reenter society. To address the issue of rehabilitation for ex-prisoners, the Division of Public Safety hosted a panel discussion yesterday titled "Life After Prison.

The chips, it seemed, had fallen just right for Columbia last season. The Lions, who hadn't broken .500 in the Ivy League season since 1993, had a team loaded with experience and a pair of formidable big men - a rarity in the Ancient Eight. But 2008 saw the streak continue.

Starting in March, taking the SAT will get a little less stressful for many high-school juniors - but not necessarily for those applying to Penn. However, both admissions officials and college consultants say that Penn's decision not to accept the College Board's Score Choice program will not affect the University's applicant pool.

Seven years ago, the Penn International Business Volunteers organized three summer consulting trips to work with Non-Governmental Organizations in developing countries. Last year, the organization turned away many of the applicants for its ten consulting trips, marking an impressive growth in interest.

The Brown men's basketball team currently has four players near the top of the Ivy League in minutes played. With this weekend's back-to-back games against defending Ivy League Champion Cornell and Columbia, those high totals could equate to sheer exhaustion for the Bears' starters as their Ivy League season gets underway.

Last semester, Philadelphia city officials set off debate when they proposed moving an already-contentious casino plan from the Waterfront area to downtown Chinatown. This news even made it across the Schuykill to Penn, where student groups decided to raise the issue.

Sharing a cultural heritage doesn't mean students hail from the same country. Unfortunately, many Latino students historically have felt tension between American- and foreign-born members of Penn Latino community, said Latino Coalition President and College sophomore Cristian Barrios.

The last time Carrie Biemer scored fewer than 10 points in a game was last Jan. 15, in a 67-50 loss at Seton Hall. As fate would have it, Biemer's 27-game double-digit scoring streak was snapped on Monday by that same Seton Hall team, as the senior captain was held to nine points and zero rebounds.

The City of Philadelphia's 2010 budget is being planned and the Mayor wants to know what you think. The Penn Project for Civic Engagement will run four workshops in February on behalf of the City to allow Philadelphia citizens' input into the early stages of composing the budget.

First there was the massive rescue of the financial industry - the $700 billion fund set aside to scoop up troubled assets from banks. Then in December, the American auto industry secured an emergency reprieve from the government to avoid bankruptcy worth billions and still possibly more.

Nearly 130 million people voted in November's election. Millions donated money, or forwent a day of work or school to talk to their neighbors about health care, crime on our streets, or the state of our public schools. And on Jan. 20th, America got a new president because of that hard work, with 1.

With a dozen of his friends watching and the crowd "oohing" and "aahing" his every move, Hicham Laalej laced a forehand down the left side of the court. The ball whizzed just over the net and landed inches inside the white line for yet another winner. It was that kind of day for the revamped men's tennis team and its highly-touted transfer in its regular season opener against Drexel.

Super Bowl XLIII may not be the only thing Penn students are wagering big bets on this week. A new Web site, Ultrinsic.com, allows students to enter a contest where earning an A in a course wins them money. The deadline for entrance is Wednesday. A $20-per-class bet plus a $2 entrance fee allows students to enter a pool which they can win outright or split with others if they earn an A or A+ in a class.

On Saturday night, The Daily Pennsylvanian honored the accomplishments of the past year and officially inaugurated its new Board of Editors and Managers. This transition marked 125 years of striving to serve the Penn community and to act as a watchdog to the administration.

Ask recently terminated Kansas City Chiefs coach Herm Edwards about the concept of a "good loss," and he'd be quick to inform that "You play to win the game!" Bring up the Penn wrestling team's Friday loss to No. 4 Nebraska (12-2-1) with Quakers coach Rob Eiter, and you will get a very different response.

With 24 seasons of Big 5 hostilities in his memory bank, Phil Martelli knows full well what the Philadelphia fan is capable of. Which helps explain why the Saint Joseph's coach might have expected worse from an electric sellout crowd at the Palestra Saturday night.

Planners of this year's RecycleMania run are using new techniques to encourage on-campus recycling - but they're recycling ideas from last year, too. Although last week marked the beginning of RecycleMania's second run at Penn, the competition won't formally begin until Thursday, when a kickoff event at Houston Hall will feature director of the Mayor's Office of Sustainability Mark Hughes speaking about ways Penn and Philadelphia can work together to improve environmentalist efforts.